Wu Guangqiang

    OF hundreds of millions of jubilant Chinese people enjoying Chinese Lunar New Year celebrations, one of the happiest people must have been Peng Gaofeng, a Hubei native living in Shenzhen. When he was reunited with his son, who had been abducted by a human trafficker three years ago, Peng beamed with joy.

    Peng Gaofeng is extremely lucky since few stories involving child-abduction have a happy ending. However, he may have owed the rescue of his son less to luck than to a modern wonder: a microblog.

    Not coincidentally, since the past Spring Festival holiday, tens of thousands of microbloggers have joined in an initiative to rescue abducted children scattered across the country. The initiative was launched by a scholar with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). Citizens across the country headed to streets to take snapshots of child beggars and put the photos online. Thousands of photos of possibly abducted children descended onto the Internet, resulting in the freeing of quite a few victims. In a sense, it was this massive microblogging campaign that facilitated Peng Gaofen’s (and some other parents’) reunion with their lost children.

    Microblog, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, is powerful with its potential as a means for the grass roots to have a say in public affairs. The intangible network is proving more tangible and efficient than any concrete social apparatus.

    On the night of Aug. 22 last year, a massive mudslide struck Zhouqu, a mountainous county in Gansu Province, temporarily cutting the place off from the outside world. The first message to reach anxious people outside was a microblog sent by a young college student nicknamed Kayne. “Flood, blackout, almost everyone is using candlelight.” That message, consisting of 19 Chinese characters, established the first communication with the world outside.

    Since the advent of this new type of media in China, microblogging has grown tremendously, evolving from a trendy program offering no more fun than an online game to a force powerful enough to influence all aspects of our society. According to the Annual Report on China’s Microblog Development in 2010, by October last year, the number of microblog users in China was 125.22 million, up from zero 18 months earlier.

    Microblogs reach every corner of the country immediately, so they beat other media in spreading news — true and false alike. This sweeping advantage makes microblog an ace tool, which, if used judiciously, will serve the people and the country in a positive way.

    It makes covering up the truth more difficult. On September 2010, Zhong Rujiu, a girl in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, sent a message through her microblog from the Nanchang airport where she was besieged, calling for help. Some of her family members had set themselves on fire during a bloody confrontation with an official demolition team that tried to tear down their house by force. As a result, her uncle died, and her mother and one of her elder sisters were seriously injured. The local government tried to conceal the truth by downplaying the incident as an “accident” and sending a team to stop Zhong Rujiu and another from going to Beijing to petition the Central Government. Hiding inside a women’s room at the airport, the cornered sisters placed their hopes on the microblog. What happened afterwards is well known. The cold-blooded officials were dismissed. This stands out as a great victory for citizens with the aid of microblogging.

    There has been much talk about nurturing a civil society and a democratic nation. Microblog has come forth in good time to push China in that direction.

    Today, the impact of microblogs is so pervasive and prevailing that many official agencies and government officials are making use of this modern invention to hear from all walks of life and, in turn, have their own voices heard.

    Nevertheless, nothing is perfect; nor is a microblog. When misused or unchecked, it can be detrimental in one way or another. Whether it can be used for good or ill depends on our discretion.

    (The author is an English tutor and a freelance writer. He can be reached at jw368@163.com.)